John Maynard Keynes

Born in Cambridge in 1883, John Maynard Keynes studied at Eton and then King’s College, Cambridge, where he was trained in mathematics before becoming one of the most influential economists of the 20th century. He also worked in public service, journalism, and finance, and his writing reached far beyond academic economics.

Keynes became widely known for challenging the idea that economies naturally return quickly to full employment after a crisis. In works including The Economic Consequences of the Peace and The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money, he argued that deep slumps could persist and that governments could use spending and policy to support jobs and demand. Those arguments helped shape what later became known as Keynesian economics.

He was also an active public figure, involved in major policy debates around both world wars and the global economy between them. Beyond economics, he moved in the Bloomsbury circle and had a strong interest in the arts, giving his life a cultural reach as well as a political and intellectual one. He died in 1946, but his influence remains central wherever people argue about how governments should respond to economic downturns.